


A privilege of Hurricane

by hhopp



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pre-Slash, based on the hurricane, still shippy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-11
Updated: 2017-09-11
Packaged: 2018-12-26 09:04:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12055704
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hhopp/pseuds/hhopp
Summary: Castiel considers it his job to rebuild him stronger than before.





	A privilege of Hurricane

**Author's Note:**

> I'm procrastinating on my DCBB again because in light of all the hurricane prep we've been doing this week, this idea just wouldn't leave me alone. I also ignored my homework to write this because school is cancelled tomorrow. I'll do it then, right? (Sorry, future me!)

     At least Noah had been warned. 

 

     Noah and his wife, his sons and all their brides, dozens of animals on one divine boat. They’d gotten a godly telegram. One would think a former angel would be awarded such courtesy, but no— Castiel is completely and utterly unprepared when the storm hits. 

 

     The air smells burnt around him when Dean stalks down into the bunker, knife dripping a trail of something or another behind it (this life would be so much easier if he could guarantee it was blood; tonight, any number of things could be falling off of that blade). _Category one. Windspeed: 80 miles per hour._

 

     Sam slinks in behind him, remorseful. Correction. _Windspeed: 95 miles per hour._

 

     And so Castiel stands up to help. With what, he doesn’t know— but he is human now, and he must prove he can still be valuable without pure blue energy and wings. The younger brother shakes his head, mouthing, “A kid died.” Ex-angel freezes in place, marble sculpture half-risen from his seat. As if the dark clouds will not see him if he is still. It is a pretty dream, at least.

 

     Thunder claps in the form of the knife hitting the table. Castiel has known many thunders in his tenure with these boys, crashing gunshots and grunts and the seething grumble of dirt hitting a coffin top. Dean goes straight for the whiskey. _Experts foresee amber storm surge._

 

     Castiel has no sandbags. No waterproof tarps and boards for the  ~~ shamrock green~~ windows  ~~ to the soul ~~ . 

 

     He understands, then, why hurricanes are named after people. 

 

     Two fingers. Four fingers. Dean looks like he’s considering five and six before Sam takes the bottle from his grasp and screws the cap on. _Windspeed: 110 miles per hour. Category two._

 

     “Go to bed, man. It’s been a long day. We’ll deal with it in the morning.” Ah, Sam, ever the still sea to juxtapose his older brother’s choppy waters. But then—

 

      _Windspeed: 115 miles per hour. Category three._

 

_Windspeed: 120 miles per hour._

 

_Windspeed: 135 miles per hour. Category four._

 

_Windspeed: faster than he can keep up with without his wings_. 

 

     And then the eye of the storm hits. _Windspeed: slowing._

 

     Dean leaves the room before his brother can see him break. While Sam is good, Sam does not go out to inspect the damage, Castiel breaks the rules. He wants to see, even if he risks being caught when the storm picks up again. 

 

_ The damage: _

 One (1) 35 year old man, crying. 

One (1) red-stained flannel shirt, likely saturated with the blood of a child. 

Zero (0) sound in the room.

 

     Atlantic hurricanes are given the names of people. Each year, weather officials use one of six lists in rotation, the items alternating between masculine and feminine and ordered alphabetically. If a storm is severe and causes massive damages, its name is retired and replaced. 

 

     Hurricane Dean was retired. 

 

     Castiel thinks he understands why.

 

     There is eery peace in the ~~emerald~~  eye of the storm. A premature echo of the destroyed silence of the aftermath. The quiet is a world balanced on the head of a pin, ready to fall at a hair trigger.

 

     Boom.

 

_Windspeed: 80 miles per hour. 95. 110. 115._

 

_Windspeed: 120 miles per hour. 135 miles per hour._

 

_Windspeed: how does one catch his breath when the air is flying by so quickly?_

 

_Windspeed: 160 miles per hour. Category five._

 

_Windspeed: the Saffir-Simpson scale does not account for Dean Winchester._

 

     If Castiel is not mistaken, the lights flicker a little bit. It may be mere coincidence, but he knows this man has power. 

 

      _Windspeed: the Saffir-Simpson scale cannot account for Dean Winchester._

 

     The lamp flies into the wall. Stacks of papers take off, airplanes, from the table. The righteous man needs to break something. (Castiel is glad that this time, he doesn’t break himself.)

 

     What is a ~~n angel~~ man to do? Well, a man’s words are useless against a storm. Wind and thunder do not listen to reason, only bellow over top of one another. So he waits. _In the event of a hurricane, remain in a safe room with no windows and stay calm._

 

     Storms never last forever, however much it may feel like it. Eventually, the winds die down. _Windspeed: 150 miles per hour. Category four._

 

      _Windspeed: 110 miles per hour. Category two._

 

_Windspeed: 65 miles per hour. No longer a hurricane, now a tropical storm._

 

_Windspeed: 10 miles per hour. Merely heavy downpour, now._

 

_Windspeed: 0 miles per hour._ The air is frighteningly still, but for the rain. 

 

     “Dean?” he tries. The leftover electricity from the lightning still hangs in the air. 

 

     “I can’t, Cas.” But he can. He doesn’t want to, he wants to internalize this. Hell if Castiel will let that happen.

 

     “How old was the child?” he prods.

 

     Dean’s shoulders fall. “Seven at the oldest,” he mumbles. Then he takes a shuddering breath. “She never cried, man. She screamed, but she didn’t cry. What’s up with that?” The haunted tone to his voice suggests that he isn’t really seeking an answer— or, at the very least, he doesn’t expect Castiel to provide one. 

 

     This never gets any easier. 

 

     So he does the only thing he can. He sits down on the edge of the bed, right by where Dean is kneeling on the ground. He settles his calloused palm against the nape of the hunter’s neck, waits a beat as Dean leans against his leg, then asks, “What can I do to help you right now?”

 

     It’s a question that has been carefully formulated. Because if he asks if there’s anything he can do, Dean will shake his head. If he leaves it at ‘what can I do to help?’ then he’ll receive some bitter comment about the girl being beyond help. Even specifying that it’s Dean he intends to help will get him nowhere without that timeframe of ‘right now.’ 

 

     Half the time, even with this query so meticulously measured and calculated, the only answer Castiel will get is an unsure sigh and a pair of slumped shoulders. Tonight is one of those nights, the bad nights. 

 

      _Expect heavy rainfall_. Castiel is no meteorologist, but he can tell you with confidence that an umbrella would not assist anyone in the encroaching monsoon.

 

     Without an answer, he makes his best guess. He slides to the ground beside the man and pulls him in close. When Dean buries his face into Castiel’s shoulder and curls into himself, makes himself look as small as possible, the not-angel carries things a step further and pulls the righteous man onto his lap. The man practically burrows into him.

 

     Castiel knows that in the morning, after Dean has crammed today into a mental filing cabinet full of mistakes he still punishes himself for, all of this will be denied. When his long-standing reservations outweigh his need for comfort from someone who lov— who cares about him, when he finds a moment to re-convince himself of what he thinks he’s supposed to be, Dean Winchester will pretend with every ounce of his heart and soul that he never once cuddled into his best friend’s embrace during a moment of emotional need.

 

     “Dean, be honest with me,” Castiel murmurs during a lull in the weeping. “Was there any realistic outcome in which that child lived? Was there truly anything that you could’ve done?”

 

     “She never cried,” Dean mumbles again into his trench coat. After that, anything he says is too muffled to hear. Castiel just pulls him in tighter and presses a small kiss to his hair.

 

     “Everything will be alright,” he tries to assure. There's no way for him to check, graceless as he is right now, but he's certain the little girl is in heaven. The good part of it, anyway.

 

     Storms leave scars on cities. You can rebuild all you want, but nothing will ever be the exact same after a hurricane. Dean Winchester is never the same after a hunt like this one. But Castiel considers it his job to rebuild him stronger than before.

**Author's Note:**

> Stay safe, everyone. And Irma? Play nice.
> 
> I own nothing. Kudos, Comments, you know the drill if you've ever read an author's note before.


End file.
